Our Lives
by Weirdly
Summary: A series of character centered drabbles. Valdemar is a good kingdom and there are good people living there. These are their stories. So I'm steering away from royalty and Heralds. Contains het, slash, femslash, and no pairing. Mostly fluff.
1. Ronto

**_Disclaimer:_ I don't own anything by Mercedes Lackey, unfortunately. Namely, Valdemar and its environs in this case. I am just a lowly fan wishing to use the world.**

**_A/N:_ Thank you for clicking on this link. I'm hoping you'll enjoy this little mini series. These are all just a bunch of drabbles giving you glimpses into the lives and worlds of their subjects. Mostly fluff. Happy people.**

**_Summary:_ Goats, a mountain, and The Rock. Ronto is a hermit and he likes his life.**

Ronto had a favorite rock. It was big, and crinkly, and a nice peaceful color of gray; and the best part was the soft moss resting all over it.

There wasn't really a reason that this was his favorite. There were lots of other crinkly big gray mossy rocks around. But the Rock always made him smile.

Maybe it was because the goats liked it. They liked it a lot, for goats; there was a lot of prancing around involved, he saw, and _his_ goats didn't often skip like that. And when his goats were happy, he was happy. It didn't matter that he subsisted entirely on goat's mild and what he could forage on the mountain. When his goats were happy, he was happy.

He would wake up before he could see the sin, with the goats. He would gather his things and walk up the mountain, with the goats. He would gather his food, with the goats. He would come back to his hut and sleep, and the goats slept outside.

Once, Ronto had lived his fays by the bells of Haven and with his Guard comrades. Those were good times, when there was no war. And then along came Karse, and they took his friends, his face, his hand, his hearing, one eye.

He decided that he liked goats better than hospitals or the people who stared at him, after that. The goats liked him, too. Him and the Rock. So it was a nice life. And he was quite happy, all alone, with only the goats. The goats and the Rock.

The Rock always made him smile. And one day of the many, many, many that ran together in Ronto's mind, he sat against the mossy gray crinkles of the sun-warmed Rock, and fell asleep with a smile on his face. With a smile on his ravaged face and his goats cavorting around him. Him and the Rock.

**_A/N(#2!!):_ Thank you for reading. I hope you liked it, and drop me a word!**


	2. Elfer

**_Disclaimer:_ Please see the first chapter. Thank you.**

**_A/N:_ Aaah...the happiness...the fluff...**

**_Summary:_ Elfer is...simple. He sweeps floors and he draws and he dreams.**

Occasionally, Elfer was sad. This didn't come very often and so startled him when it did. But it always passed quickly and left him to dry the tears off his face.

Mostly Elfer was happy. He was warm, most of the time, and all he had to do was sweep floors for Ark and Emil, the nice men who let him stay.

Elfer didn't know what was outside his block. He didn't care. When the talk turned to Heralds and some bad man who wanted to steal Iftel (like Fletch, who ate pears without paying) Elfer retreated to his room and drew his pictures.

Sometimes, after he was sad, the pictures were dark and rainy, scary and horror-filled. He never remembered making those pictures. He only barely remembered making pictures of the fruit and the people he knew.

But whether bad of good, Elfer thought about his day before he went to sleep and he faithfully made a picture of it.

And then he lay down of his warm straw pallet and dreamt.

**_A/N(#2!!):_ Thank you for reading! I appreciate it. And...(hint hint)...reviews warm my heart...**


	3. Emil

**_Disclaimer:_ Please see the first chapter.**

**_A/N: _And...another! Joy!**

**_Summary:_ There is a place in the Eastern Empire where (almost) homophobic. So Emil runs away to Valdemar and opens a restaurant.**

Originally, Emil was from the tiny province Esteria in the Eastern Empire. Not a lot was tolerated there. Rotten fruit, bright pink, beggar boys on the street, learning any language but Esterian, shay-a-chern children – they would not stand for any of this. Of course not.

But it didn't change. Maybe because it all subtly solved itself: beggar boys clothed themselves in bright pink and ate rotten fruit, nobody seemed to know that there was any language but Esterian, the shay-a-chern children either disguised themselves or ran away.

Emil was one who ran away. He was the son of a middle-class butcher couple and after a few nightmares where his Papa found out about his preferences and chased him with a cleaver, he packed up, stole a bit from the till, bought a Gate, and ran through into Valdemar.

It wasn't so great, at first, being a stranger who couldn't speak Valdemaran. But he found a sturdy little inn with some sturdy people who gave him room and board until their son Chan the second could teach him Valdemaran.

He fell in love with Chan's younger brother Ark and Ark fell in love right back. They moved to Haven and opened the first Esterian restaurant.

Because the food was very delicious and because it turned into a major shaych 'spot', it was very popular; so Emil and Ark had no lack of money and material goods. But their joys were not over beautiful new cushions that they could have stuffed with coin – no. Their best times were curled up together in their bed, slowly falling asleep and dreaming with each other.


	4. Rose

**_Disclaimer:_ Please look at the first chapter.**

**_A/N:_ Yay.**

**_Summary:_ Not a Herald.**

For a while, all Rose wanted was to be a Herald. Then, as she said it, her coward side kicked in and she learned to cook and clean, figure and read so she was perfectly ready to inherit the inn from her mother and father.

She was a year into managing it alone and wishing for love (she remained a dreamer) when a man named Chan approached her asking for hire. She gave it to him – she had been rather overworked lately.

It wasn't long before Rose and Chan were married and living with a few littles to their name. Rose forgot why she had every wanted to be a Herald with her goodly life and sturdy happiness. And every night she locked up the inn and tidied, checked in on all the children and the guests, and lay down with Chan and tripped into a deep dream-filled sleep.


End file.
